Let’s use Mary Had a Little Lamb with everyone playing together. You can play just right hand or hands together. Basically everyone films themself playing the piece along with [s3mm type=”file” s3bucket=”katiesuzuki123web” files=”Performances/mary backing.mp3″]this backing track[/s3mm]:

[s3mm type=”audio” s3bucket=”katiesuzuki123web” files=”Performances/mary backing.mp3″ /]

Then upload your video to me here, using the link further down this page. I then edit all the videos together onto one screen. I hope that it will be very motivating for students spread around the globe to see themselves playing music as part of a group. Children in particular always like to watch other children, but students of any age can participate.  

I tried this out on my family recently (using Aunt Rhody) and here is the result.

[fvplayer id=”292″]

I plan to put the video we make onto Youtube, Facebook and onto this website so it will be freely viewable. You’ll be able to send these links to your friends and family.

I know that some people are careful about their children’s online privacy so I want to let you know my plans. The image of each child is fairly low resolution and I won’t be using surnames but if you have privacy concerns about your child’s participation please contact me and perhaps we can make it work.

I have chosen a piece in early book 1 because I’d like as many people as possible to be able to participate and I have quite a lot of beginners. Your child doesn’t need to be able to play hands together, just right hand is fine, or just left hand, it will all add into the mix 🙂

Let’s have a deadline of Sunday 2 Aug (now extended to Sun 9 Aug) for your uploaded videos. Upload your video using the link below. After 9 Aug I’ll start putting all the videos together. That will be exciting.

I am expecting videos taken on phones and ipads, no need for professional quality. I just want to encourage everyone to take part.

 Here is what to do:

• Get headphones and set it up so you can play the backing track (with the 4 extra notes at the beginning). You might be able to play it directly from this page or you could right click on it then “save as”. I want the video to record the sound of your piano but not the backing track.
• Choose where you’ll stand to do the filming. It would be nice to be able to see the student’s faces and hands if you can. Think about the light levels in your room. If it is dark turn an extra light on. It is probably helpful to find something to rest the phone/ipad on (maybe the back of a chair) so that it stays steady. Hold your phone/ipad “landscape” (so the longer dimension goes across and the vertical dimension is shorter). After your child plays I’d like them to bow. When I did my trial video I found it worked best to get off the piano seat away from the direction of the camera so that the video captures more of the whole person rather than just a big face disappearing from view 🙂 but do whatever seems to work best.
• Now you’re ready to film. Get your child seated at the piano and put the headphones on them. Start filming, then start the backing track. They’ll hear me ask for 4 notes, be sure to film them playing these notes because that helps me sync up the audio later. Keep filming while they play the piece and while they get off the seat and bow at the end.
• Watch the video together and check you are both happy with it. This is all just for fun, I am not expecting perfection! Then browse to this page on your phone/ipad. Fill in the form below and click “Select Files”, select the video you just took and when it has loaded to 100% click “Submit”.

Try not to leave it till the last minute, send me your video soon!

Note: video files are large and will take a while to upload, 1-10 mins depending on your connection. Once the upload reaches 100% please click “Submit” which will send the video through to me. This page should refresh then if you scroll back down here you should see a message saying “thank you for your upload”. If your video doesn’t manage to reach 100% uploaded then something isn’t working so please contact me and I’ll take a look. This form will allow you to upload one file (mov,mpg,mp4,avi,mp3,wav) up to 512MB.

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